Transcripts For MSNBCW All In With Chris Hayes 20181020

You are the reason i stay up at night. When all in starts right now. Good evening from new york, im chris hayes. Tonight, breaking news, after two weeks of obfuscation and angry denials the saudi government has finally admitted that Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi is dead. And that they killed him. Here is their story via the official saudi press agency. The prime mare investigation indicated discussions which occurred between him, that would be khashoggi, and the persons who met him while he was present at the kingdoms consulate led to a quarrel and fighting, which led to his death. They were saying it was an accident, result of a quarrel that got out of hand. Thats what the saudis want you to believe. The turkish Officials Say they have evidence, much of it confirmed by other journalists, that 15 saudi agents flew into istanbul on october 2nd, assassinated mr. Khashoggi, dismembered his body with a bone saw they brought for that purpose, and flew out the same day. One of those agents is a forensic doctor who specializes in autopsies. It doesnt say what has happened to the body of Jamal Khashoggi. Tonight as we mourn the death of a Washington Post journalist at the hands of a government that wanted to silence him, donald trump is currently in arizona preparing for another maga rally like the one he held last night in montana, in which he cheered the criminal, physical assault of a journalist from the guardian by a republican congressman who didnt like the question he was being asked. Representative Greg Gianforte pleaded guilty to that assault. Trump and the crowd loved it. Any guy that can do a body slam, hes my kind of hes my guy. I shouldnt say this nothing to be embarrassed about. I was in rome with a lot of the leaders from other countries talking about all sorts of things, and i heard about it. And we endorsed greg very early. But i had heard that he body slammed a reporter. And he was way up, and he was way up. And i said, oh, this was like the day of the election or just before, and i said, oh, this is terrible. Hes going to lose the election. Then i said, well, wait a minute, i know montana pretty well. I think it might help him. And it did. As trump was making these comments a cnn reporter tweeted i saw one young man in the crowd making body slam gestures, he looked at me and ran his thumb across his throat. I talked to him after the rally was over and he couldnt stop laughing. Seems well past wondering if the rhetoric is just harmless talk. Jamal khashoggi himself who we can confirm tonight has been killed by the saudis, warned last year that the possibility of what he called the trump effect was goading Saudi Crown Prince mohammad bin salman toward more aggressive actions. That made prince mohammad bin salman feel empowered to this impulsive behavior in Foreign Policy . It is dangerous. Joining me by phone from dubai, msnbc a reporter with extensive knowledge. Ayman, what do you make of this report by the Saudi Official News Agency . I think you have to take it in its totality. Anyone who is watching in and has watched what has unfolded the past couple of days will look at this and immediately think this is something that has been in the making for some time. This was clearly a narrative that the saudis were slowly trying to put together and floating and testing to see how much they can buy time until they can come up with an explanation that clearly does not meet any of the questions or answer any of the questions that people had. And we take that step by step. What i mean by that is as you mentioned in the outline, the prosecutors statement that came out tonight identified that Jamal Khashoggi is dead. Interestingly enough the foreign minister put out a statement they acknowledged this was an attempted rendition. They say these individuals who traveled to istanbul to meet with khashoggi did so after it appeared that there was information that they were going to be able to bring him back to the kingdom. So clearly there are a lot of questions that this was not an individual who was just walking in to process some paperwork. There was an operation intended to do something to khashoggi. What that is is why there are still so many questions because as you mentioned 15 individuals dont get in a fight with an individual going in to process some paperwork and then suddenly have his body disappear over an argument. There are a lot of questions. But thats only part of it. The second part of it has to deal with a lot of the secondary announcements that came out of the royal court this evening. And that includes a lot of dismissals of senior members of the Saudi Intelligence Services in addition to a Senior Adviser of the royal court. When you put all of that in its totality, you can understand why people are saying this amounts to a coverup. How is it possible that the deputy general of the Saudi Intelligence Agency carried out an operation, a possible operation of rendition, acknowledged by the Saudi Foreign Ministry Statement without a command or an order from somebody in the royal court . I think people who watch saudi arabia very closely will be quick to say an order like that does not happen without the most senior levels of the royal family aware of it, in specific with the crown prince himself. Why that is significant is because it seems this evening, from all of the movements and all of the different announcements that have happened, the crown prince is not going to be implicated in this. How do we know that . Well, the king issued a decree a short while ago issuing a statement that says hes ordering the formation of a Ministerial Committee to review and implement changes to modernizing the saudi intelligent agency. The person whos going to be heading that is the crown prince. So i think any analyst who watches this, who is saying is the crown prince going to be implicated, did the crown prince give the order, the answer tonight is, according to the king of saudi arabia, it is unlikely that the crown prince is going to be implicated in this in any way. And some of the unofficial chatter thats been coming out of the kingdom tonight suggests the crown prince is going to in some way or in some capacity say he had no knowledge of this operation with the specific details it entailed. One item that seems worthwhile to mention, right, is that the saudis have given flatly false statements for two weeks on this. They said he left out of the embassy, of the consulate. They gave an interview to reuters saying he wasnt there. Mohammad bin salman himself, if im not mistaken, says my understanding is he left within an hour of getting there. There has been theres a real credibility issue with the saudi official line. Caller theres absolutely a credibility issue with the saudi official line. For anyone whos been watching this closely, and this is where it gets tricky. Because on one hand you have to trust the turkish government in what they are saying, which is that the turkish government has overwhelming evidence that this murder took place inside the consulate, that his body was dismembered, they put together obviously the list of individuals who traveled to the kingdom. Sorry, who traveled from the kingdom to turkey to carry out this operation. As a result of this right now what you have is the saudi arabiian government essentially saying he died as a result of a quarrel that turned into a fistfight. That immediately raises the question, again, is the Saudi Arabian government lying if they knew he died as a result of a fistfight, why in the world have they not been able to provide evidence of where the body is . Thats a significant question. The turks say they have overwhelming evidence, including an audio recording. It does also put pressure on the turkish government to provide what evidence they have to back up their narrative. But for the most part, as this event has played out from day one, it has been the turks whose story has been somewhat corroborated by the fact that, you know, khashoggis body was never recovered, so far it hasnt been recovered, the notion he may have been alive never materialized and the saudi government today confirmed that. The fact they want to put out the narrative that it was as a result of a fight, they now have to provide concrete evidence as to how they came to that conclusion. Because if its just purely the testimony of these 15 individuals, the turks themselves have not been able to interview these individuals. And theres going to be serious questions as to whether or not, from a justice standpoint, theres going to be a transparent process in which these individuals can be questioned in some kind of form. Some people have suggested it needs to be United Nations to avoid there being any kind of coverup. Youve been hearing the statements coming out of the white house that a lot of people are saying amounts to a washington coverup. Yeah. So i think there are a lot of concerns that the investigation itself, at least coming from the Saudi Royal Court and coming from the saudi public happened to Jamal Khashoggi. Ayman, thank you very much. Senator, let me start with a statement the white house put out after this ridiculous charade the saudis have dragged everyone through over the death of this man. United states acknowledges the announcement from the kingdom of saudi arabia, its investigation into the fate of Jamal Khashoggi is progressing and that it has taken action against the suspects it has identified thus far. We will continue to closely follow the International Investigations into this tragic incident and advocate for justice that is timely transparent and in accordance with all due process. We are saddened to hear confirmation of mr. Khashoggis death. We offer our deepest condolences to family, fiance and friends. Am i wrong that thats inyesterdayly weak . Its embarrassing for our country, truly. Lets take it away from anything else, just look at the story. A man who works for the Washington Post, whos been a critic of the saudi government, wants to get married. And he goes in to the embassy, as i can see the picture, just dressed as a civilian. Didnt look like didnt have anybody else with him for protection. He walks in. He never comes out. And then you see the pictures of kind of an execution squad, you know, coming into the embassy. And we hear gruesome stories. And for us to just say, oh, were so glad theyre doing all this and to see pompeo our secretary of state sit there and smile, i mean, what was his next stop, to visit jack the ripper . I am so saddened for our nation. And then this business of, oh, we you know, we better be careful because they buy 110 billion worth of weapons, now its turned into 450 billion. I dont know what theyre buying. Maybe theyre going to his hotels, Trumps Hotels and spending all that money. This thing just embarrassing. Its sad. Its awful. And at the rally trump then, you know, praises a congressman who committed a felony. Yeah. And beat up a reporter. So this thing is awful. One more point id make, serving so many years on the Foreign Relations committee, with president s republican and democratic, they all had the voice of leadership, morality and, you know, the rest of the world had to catch up with us. We can deal with complications of a relationship. I understand the middle east is complicated. Sure. But this is someone who worked in our nation, who was moving forward with a voice of clarity on freedom of the press. Yeah, he had some things in his past that im sure he regretted. But right now and his last column, if you read it, was magnificent, really, in terms of the importance of the people in the middle east knowing the truth. What did you i want to you mentioned this, so i want to ask a followup question. The president in front of a group of thousands of americans in an arena last night, doing his best to bring out the worst of the people, these people who if they came across ben jacobs who left with his glasses open, offered him aid, would have felt sympathetic to him, outraged if this happened to him. But the president has the ability to make people be terrible. Its one of his most, i think, dangerous qualities. What did you think of that moment . Well, its another horrifying moment. But, you know, i dont i cant blame the president for everything. These are people there that are applauding this. What are they thinking . What is the message to our children . Im a grandmother. I wonder whats going, sinking into those minds. I have an 11yearold and a couple of 9yearolds now, and an adult one at 23. I wonder whats sinking into their minds. Hes gone after the press in ways, again, that belie the very basis of our nation, which is freedom of speech, freedom of the press. The press makes every elected official crazy. I can tell you that right now. But thats their job since watergate. Youve got to be expecting that thats going to happen. Another point id make is the president often talks about abraham lincoln, one of the few president s he thinks is better than he, maybe. But president lincoln said he wanted to appeal to the better angels of our nature. And what this man does is he goes out and brings out the worst in people. Yes, the people go along with it, which is thats a whole other topic. But the fact is, hes supposed to lead us, lead us in a way that makes us proud. And he does the opposite. All right, barbara boxer, thank you so much for joining us tonight. Thank you. Here with me now, josh leaderman, a National Political reporter. Josh, i couldnt help but notice this report is released at 1 00 a. M. Riyadh time which makes one think that the audience for this is not domestic, but the friday here with me now, josh leaderman, a National Political reporter. Josh, i couldnt help but notice this report is released at 1 00 a. M. Riyadh time which makes one think that the audience for this is not domestic, but the friday news dump here in the u. S. Its funny, chris, we talk about mastering the friday night news dump in the United States, it seems like if theres one aspect of how to deal with Crisis Management that the saudis have picked up its that you do it at a time like friday night, middle of the night in riyadh, when nobody is going to be awake to see this. But its also important to note, chris, that since khashoggi disappeared, what has been distributed to the public in saudi arabia has been very different than what we are all reading and hear about all around the world. The focus inside saudi arabia has been really focused on how, you know, people are trying to disparage the kingdom and attempts by turkey and qatar to spin up misinformation, really portraying the kingdom as a victim in all of this. It shouldnt be surprising that now even as they are coming clean about parts of this that they are not doing it in a way thats totally forthcoming to their public. The white house and the president himself have seemed to be at pains to signal precisely to the saudis what would meet their threshold for everyone to sort of wash their hands and say, okay, weve gotten past this. I wonder how you think this will be received in washington past the white house, particularly in the senate Foreign Relations committee among Congressional Republicans and democrats. Not well, chris. Weve already seen statements on twitter and actual written statements from folks like senator lindsey graham, elliott engle, the top democrat on the House Foreign Affairs committee, saying this does not seem like credible, that people do not buy this explanation in congress. And elsewhere in the Foreign Policy community. Whether the white house is going to say that they accept this is another story. And i think the big unanswered question here is how much intelligence is already out there within the u. S. Government about what happened . Because if theres intelligence that contradicts the public line which was that the saudis didnt send people to kill him, they sent him there to have a discussion with him, something went wrong, and there was some type of a fistfight and he died, if that is contradicted by intelligence thats out there, its going to be very difficult for the white house to try to ignore all of that. Theres also some question about any sort of official actions happening in congress. I mean, there are things that congress could do. There are provisions about stopping arms sales, there are votes they could take, the u. S. Continues to aid and abet the saudi led war in yemen responsible for the greatest humanitarian led crisis in the world right now, do you think this is going to carry over by the Time Congress comes back . Absolutely. I think it will. And there are several options available to congress from what weve heard from lawmakers so far its pretty clear there will be an attempt to use the global magnitsky act to sanction individuals who might have been involved in what looks like egregious violations of human rights. There are other steps that could be taken. Senator feinstein has talked about cutting off arm sales with the kingdom as youve alluded to. Theres also been talks within the senate and senate Foreign Relations committee in particular, cutting off discussions going on between the United States and saudi arabia about the one, two, three agreement. Letting the u. S. Work with saudi arabia to rebuild Nuclear Power plants there. And there are some in congress and the senate particularly who are saying we should stop those discussions until we get this fully resolved. All right, josh ledderman, thank you for taking time tonight. Ahead, 18 days out, the incredible republican strategy of telling voters theyre the ones who will protect obamacare and coverage for preexisting conditions. That story in two minutes. [ applause ] thats the group. This is a repeal and a replace of obamacare, make no mistake about it, make no mistake. Jubilant cheers of that group of very homogenous house republicans, a bill that never passed the senate and a bill that now haunts them. Health care has emerged as the single Biggest Issue in the midterms. Republicans are desperate to change the subject and erase peoples memory of moments like this. When just six days after that Health Care Vote republican congressman tom mcarthur whose amendment resuscitated a dead bill was confronted by a constituent. There was a horrible bill available to you from a horrible group of people who believe that we dont deserve health insurance. These are the people in your party that youre working with. These are the people that came up with a plan thats going to kill millions of people, and i read the bill that you sponsored. I read the one that you were willing to say yes to. I know exactly whats going on, congressman, and youre going to fund that out in 2018. And so now mcarthur is running attack ads from cop killers and terrorists because the very last thing that mcarthur wants is for anyone to vote on health care. Discussing the predicament, bringing in dorian warren, very involved with the work on the health care bill, it is remarkable how much they are trying to both memory hold the entire fight in which they passed that and now to also turn around and say like were the ones who are here to defend it. You used the word desperate. When youre desperate to win an election that it looks like youre going to lose, you will pull out all the stops. Play one, just lie, whats up is down, whats down is up, its very or wellian in the magnitude of the lie. I want to play evidence of that. One of them is the health care two things that have gone after preexisting conditions, the bill they passed. Thats right. And a lawsuit thats currently working its way through court that state ags and state governors have signed onto. These are a bunch of people who support either the bill or the lawsuit saying i support preexisting conditions. Take a listen. Earlier this year we learned our oldest has a rare chronic disease, preexisting condition. Im josh hawley, i support forcing Insurance Companies to cover all preexisting conditions. Thats why im taking on both parties and fighting for those with preexisting conditions. I voted to protect people with preexisting conditions. I want to repeal obamacare, reduce premiums, protect preexisting conditions. So thats that i mean and they are doing it everywhere. Play one, lie, just lie, pretend like your position, which is unpopular, isnt your position any longer. Play two is fear. Usually what they do is use racism or sometimes homophobia. Were seeing the threat or fear of brown and black people, immigrants, muslims, which is what donald trump did in 16, using the fear of the other, youre losing your country to those brown and black people. Play three is break the rules. Were seeing this too. Suppress the vote. So georgia, texas, north dakota, you just change the rules to suppress the other sides right to tilt the Playing Field in your favor. Were seeing all three of those plays right now in this election, lie, fear, using racism in particular, and break the rules. Whats interesting for all the national conversation, when you look into the data, democrats are really running on health care, they really are, its in 62 of their ads, youve got Midterm Election top issues, health care 71 , economy jobs at 64 . So theyre really on the other side democrats really have been focused in on this. The polling shows its become more popular. In the last two years, support for Health Insurers covering preexisting conditions has gone up even among republicans and independents. Its becoming a National Consensus before our eyes. Indead. We learned today there was a study from the Economic Policy institute that shows American Workers have paid 400 billion in lost wages towards health care costs. The focus should really be on the costs, the rising costs of health care, and instead of repealing and replacing obamacare we should be thinking about repealing and replacing the trump tax cuts, which senator Kamala Harris Just Announced a bill yesterday to do i will see you tomorrow morning at least there was a debate before about what kind of health care we want. Its gone away. Once they lost the health care fight, theyve started lying about it. Part of the reason you mentioned the polling here, this blows my mind, aca favorability right now, 54 favorable in the fox news poll, a record for it. This thing has been under water, its been 30 forever. I saw someone on twitter joke that were just a few short elections away from a republican looking into the camera saying only i will protect your obamacare from the democrats. Yeah, well, look at the history of social security. Who supported it in 1935 and who didnt . And why is it a third reel of politics now . Republicans knew that aca would become more popular if it passed and especially once people started experiencing it in their lives and their familys lives. The same thing weve seen with to the extent the republicans have a health care message in this election, and ive looked at a bunch of ads, democrats will take away your medicare because republicans are the party to defend medicare. But we also heard Mitch Mcconnell say earlier this week bait and witch. We gave away the line. Were going to have to cut spending, particularly medicare, medicaid and social security, its too expensive, knowing the trillion dollar trump tax cut, that was play one in that playbook of starve the beast so you can cut the programs you hate later. They cant be honest. Right. You cant be honest with something thats fundamentally unpopular. Dorian warren, thanks for making some time. Thanks, chris. Congressman steve king, youve heard about him, he is facing his first reelection threat in years with 18 days to go before the midterms, kings endorsement in a Canadian Election thats making headlines. This week king tweeted his support for faith goldy. A neonazi sympathizer. Her greatest virtue is being prowestern civilization and a fighter for our values. Goldy was fired last year from a far right news outlet after she appeared on a podcast produced by the neonazi website the daily stormer. Shes also questioned whether immigration is contributing to a White Genocide in canada. Thats the person that steve king wants to be the mayor of toronto. It turns out people of iowa have been paying attention to kings support. This week the Des Moines Register, kings hometown paper, has endorsed his opponent democrat j. D. Schullton writing in his 16 years in Congress King has passed one bill as primary sponsor, redesignating a post office, rarely holds public town halls, instead spends his time with fascist leaders in europe. Joining me is steve schullton. By the way, we asked congressman king to join us tonight and he declined. J. D. , first question, is steve kings message back in iowa like the one he has on twitter where hes constantly talking about how much he loves fascist sympathizers in europe and neonazis sympathizing mayoral candidates. Its really not. Thank you for allowing me to be on the show. Its bizarre to hear him talk about toronto and the mayoral race. Its weird to see hes had as many tweets about that, where we have a highway in sioux city go four lane. We had a celebration on that. Hes had as many tweets on that mayoral race as that highway. His message doesnt resonate as well as weve seen in the past. Let me ask you this. You know, are the vision that he lays out is fear about White Genocide, association with white nationalists and neonazis, retweeting them, is that the values of the people in the district youre trying to represent . Not at all. And when we have folks from all over the nation come help us out we talk ive been doing a town hall tour, doing a town haul in all 39 counties, we call it the cant fake showing up tour, we go out and talk about immigration all the time and how we need an immigrant workforce in this district. And we have two pork plants that the executive directors of those places have talked about the need for that. Last harvest i went to one of the grain elevators. When i talked to their board, they mentioned how they needed 39 people to help with the harvest, and they didnt get one american citizen. And so theres a need for an immigrant workforce in this district. What about trade in that district . I know its been a hot issue in a lot of places. Has steve king do you have a difference with him on the president s trade fight with china . Absolutely. I mean, hes not willing to go out there and look farmers in the eye right now. Where were going out there talking to folks, and we oppose this trade war. You see to summit all up right now, were borrowing money from china to give to not to sell products to china. When china starts looking down at south america, we spent 30 years trying to get into china and for them to all the sudden shift like that its not going to be easy to come back. I was looking at your district. And like duncan hunters district, california 50th, we were talking to the candidate last night, its plus 11 republican, what do you say to people, say, look, yeah, steve king, i dont like the things he tweets, i think hes said ugly stuff, fundamentally im a conservative or a republican, why should i vote for someone thats from the Democratic Party . Yeah, i mean, its about showing up at this point. He spent five of the last six years going to austria on taxpayer dime, he hasnt been to most of the counties five of the last six years. Thats the big contrast, showing up and we talk about being a rural democrat. Its not easy. But when you go out there and look your voters in the eye and out on this town hall tours just talking with folks and engaging with anybody and everybody, its been awesome. And just today i had five different people tell me, hey, im a republican, but im voting for you. They just appreciate the hustle and grit and using the term that the Des Moines Register referred to me as, and thats what were all about. Let me ask you this. Would you have voted to repeal obamacare, would you have voted for that repeal bill . Thats the other thing is, no, we need to expand on it. And i feel the Affordable Care act was a step. Im talking about medicare for all out there. And really . Thats yeah, absolutely. People are engaged in it. Talking to a farmer right now, as much as were talking about the depressed agriculture economy, were talking about health care and the need. They dont have employer insurance. Yeah, all right. J. D. Scolton from the Fourth District in iowa taking on steve king. Thank you very much. I appreciate it. Thank you very much, chris. First charges of attempted election interference of the 2018 midterms by a Russian National. That story ahead. Plus, ted cruz plays it cool, rolls with the punches and definitely does not get flustered by an i phone. Many People Living with diabetes monitor their blood glucose every day. Which means they have to stop. And stick their fingers. Repeatedly. Today, lifechanging technology from abbott makes it possible to track glucose levels. Without drawing a drop of blood, again and again. The most personal technology, is technology with the power to change your life. Life. To the fullest. Beto orourke, the democratic candidate for senate for texas has made the Facebook Live the hallmark of his campaign, he does it all the time, documenting life on the trail, from long drives to skate boarding in the parking lot of a fast food chain and air drumming to the who also at a what a burger. He stays so thin, his opponent ted cruz decided to use that as an attack line. Calling orourke a quote triple meat what a burger liberal. I have no idea what that means. It made for good fodder for the newest anticruz ad, starring just as a consumer, im a big fan of eating white castle burgers. I like their little burgers. I dont know what that is. Theres not a white castle within 900 miles of texas, ted. Maybe up in canada, huh . Well, ted cruz is clapping back at beto again, doing Facebook Live videos now too. Thats thing two in 60 seconds. So ted cruz wants in on the Facebook Live action, but unlike his opponent bay to orourke, who is a seasoned Facebook Live professional, kruz had a bunch of trouble when he tried to broadcast an interview with mark davis yesterday. Secure the border, how do you do that . Build a wall, but a walls not everything. You use technology, you use infrared, use fixed wing and rotary wing aircraft. Use boots on the ground. Triple the u. S. Border patrol. For the technical thing, are we sideways. Someone call, on your computer screen, were sideways, which would be we may not win i. T. Department of the year if were its like an episode of dont put your hand over the camera. I think you need to hold it vertically. I dont know that. Its sideways when youre holding it horizontally. Theres a certain app for that. Hold it vertically and leave it there. It tells you we wont let you. Well, its sideways on the screen. Hold it vertical and ignore what it tells you. Leave it right there. Lift it slightly up. Uncorroborated allegations, sometimes absurd and ridiculous emily, youre broadcasting yourself, you flipped it. I know. You flipped back. One of the closest one of the closest gubernatorial races in the country is playing out in florida. Local issues still matter. We heard that earlier when we went down. The red tide is a big issue down here. Of course. Not a national issue, but very much matters to floridians. It is specific to florida, its a big deal. We need people in office that will help protect our environment for the future. Trymaine lee has been covering this story. Im a registered republican, im conservative, im progun. You know, but i dont have a problem voting for a democrat if hes on the right side of this issue. The Biggest Issue for many people in florida this election season, the red tide. Sarasota and manatee counties are seeing a full bloom of red tide. The water, you can still see, is brown is murky. 11 dolphins have been found dead and experts fear red tide is to blame. Florida is facing an Environmental Crisis in the form of toxic algae. On the coasts its red tide. In the canals and waterways, its bluegreen algae. Its dessimating marine life. People say theyre getting sick just from breathing. Everything is at stake. My lifestyle is at stake. My recreation is at stake. Everything i own is at stake. Its all on the line here. What role does policy play in all this . There needs to be some tightening down of the screws of regulation. And we need to hold those accountable for that pollution. Josh greer owns a fly fishing shop near fort myers. Hes a member of the Nonprofit Organization captains for clean water. Its election year, how have the dynamics played out . Every politician is talking about it, at least, thats a step in the right direction. If we can get politicians to talk about it, we can get them to do the right thing. Toxic algae is polluting floridas rivers and beaches. Red tide is wreaking havoc on our community. Congressman Vern Buchanan is fighting Vern Buchanan took over 100,000 from big sugars special interests. The blooms are mostly caused by runoff from industrial farms, fertilizers overloaded with nutrients. They travel to floridas rivers and canals. What doesnt end up in the lake seeps into ground water. Those nutrients are supercharging the algae blooming, turning Pristine Waters into this. It is the most severe and by far the longest running red tide weve seen in recent years. John scott is concerned about whats happening on the coast and in the canals and rivers. Bluegreen algae is a big concern, incredibly toxic, on par with poison dart venom or cobra venom. Ill protect our clean air and water, not corporate polluters. Dealing with the algae blooms and the red tide weve seen, this is going to be a priority. The issue is front and center in races across the state. Most notably in the u. S. Senate race between bill nelson and the current governor, rick scott, who picked up a new nickname, red tide rick. And its fair to blame rick scott. He savaged environmental safeguards. Bill nelson made a pledge 30 years ago to solve this problem, but nelsons a talker, not a do ear. Any indication there might be a policy situation, any hope, is there any hope . Yeah, the Midterm Elections, thats a big hope. If we can get even some of the people trying to get elected elected who care about our environment, that will go a long way towards making progress on the policy front. Yet another great piece of reporting from our own trymaine lee. Thank you for that. Coming up, another issue cropping up ahead of the Midterm Elections tonight. New charges against a Russian National alleging election interference for the midterms. Thats next. Migraine with botox®. What if you had fewer headaches and migraines a month . 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We have a first tonight. New charges against a Russian National for conspiring to interfere with the Midterm Elections next month. Elena kushanova was charged with conspiracy to defraud the United States. The Justice Department described her as the, quote, chief accountant of a project that spent millions of dollars to solve w discord in the american political system. This is on top of indictments this year against 13 Russian Nationals in connection with the 2016 president ial election. Russia is far from the only country using social media to try to influence politics in the u. S. And beyond, the news that twitter yesterday suspended a network of suspected bots that bushed pro saudi arabia hash tags and talking points about Jamal Khashoggi, the Washington Post columnist who was killed in a consulate weeks ago. Here to help me understand whats at stake here the executive director of recode and host of the recode decode podcast. Benecol lines. One of the by lines about the bot story. Theyre fun ones, arent they . Yes. And it had a very russian feel to it having encountered russian bots before. And there are a lot of them out there. How dare you southlander the kingdom. And you probably saw they got retweeted a lot. That was the whole point. It was to drum up there was some public support for this, the idea that it didnt exist, the idea that the Saudi Arabian government had this worldwide support that wasnt really there. Thats the number one hash tag trend on twitter in sunday in the entire world was a pro saudi hash tag in response to this thing. Wow. If you were feeling it on twitter, you were just like the rest of us. We were all there. Have they moved since the saudi government now admitted that they killed Jamal Khashoggi . I think theyre sort of regrouping a little bit. The ones that are talking are a little contrite, but theyre also were about a solved. Weve absolved ourselves here. We didnt mean to do this. Its bad. In terms of bot activity, its basically gone. Cara, do you feel like, there has been so much attention on this, and Sheryl Sandberg the other day was posting on facebook photos of war room that facebook has for their Election Integrity unit. Do they have their hands around this problem . Its a really nice pr move to do that. They brought in all kinds of journalists if you saw 100 articles about the war room. Its just a room full of computers. With screens there are monitors as well. Yes, exactly. And maybe some keyboards. You know, i think the thing is, they want to show that theyre committed to stopping this. But the fact is the bots have run wild all the time, on twitter, facebook, everywhere it can go. I think whats really interesting to think about is theyre sort of bots for hire. During the roseanne thing, a lot of things were bots that started the problem and humans interact with it. Bots get everything started and humans like you were talking to bots. I dont talk to them. I have a no bot policy. A no bot policy. But i think the issue is they want to start to sow discord. In the rosen thing there are bots creating problems around samantha b. Whatever issue there is theyll create discord. Thats the point of the situation. Thats what we saw in the indictment, it wasnt even unidirectional. Its stirring the pot, stirring the pot. Polarize both sides to the point where we have to talk to each other at some point, its not going to happen. Part of it too, kara, there is a particular toxicity to a kind of loaded political conversation that happens on social media. Right. That has a weird uncanniness to it thats distinct from the normal kinds of fights you have, either arguments in person or with people you know. But what they do is they pick topics that will polarize. Instead of stuff that becomes common, they dont want to discuss commonality. And the whole point is these social Media Companies should be able to eliminate. Should it be the lowest bar for these companies. To get rid of this . Of course it does, of course it does. They can identify child porn. They can identify regular pornography. They can do this. Its just the efforts that it takes to do it. And they have to rid their platforms of these things, because it creates toxicity. It creates confusion. It creates noise. It creates polarization. They should have had them off there by now at this point and not allow these, like the Saudi Arabian thing to go on. Its the fact that it continues with every story is shocking to me. In the case of the saudi bots and twitter, what prompted them to remove it . How did that happen . I didnt mean to like thats what happened. So they werent affirmatively wait a second, is the number one hash tag in the world really a pro saudi message . Heres the thing. Its not that hard to find. You take that number one hash tag. Thats what we did there is a guy named josh russell. He is an i. T. Professional. He lives in indiana. He has been doing this for several months now. You take the top trending thing on twitter you. Get a set of every twitter account that tweeted about it and you see the ones that were created on the same day. This takes like 20 minutes. This is not a complicated process. So you went through with him to that. And when you asked twitter, oh, yeah, maybe we should take that down. We have found other ones too. Its even more than you think. Here thats question i had, kara, when i looked at the war room at facebook and them saying were committed i forget what phrase. Were committed to protecting Election Integrity around the world, and i thought maybe you have too much power. Maybe one room full of your employees with a bunch of computers arent the people who should be in charge of Election Protection for everyones election pleasant the world. Exactly. I think i said this before you before, and we discussed this before is they literally, these are the people that are in charge of these things. And are they equipped for it . Has it become a monster they cant control . And the issue is the platform was created to do this. Theyre not this is not hacking, which also happen had on facebook, by the way. Its not hacking. The people are using these platforms the way they were built. And so maybe they shouldnt be built this way. Maybe they should change the way theyre built. Maybe they should they should do Different Things so this is engagement and virality. Getting people so angry they have to click refresh is a feature, not a bug. Thats what theyre engineered to do. The bots come in and use the tool for what its been engineered to do. Totally. There is also this loophole, the New York Times had this story in the Virginia House race, an anonymous attack ad popping up on facebook, which was, kara, a problem they were supposed to a loophole they were supposed to close. Yep, right. Which apparently has not been closed. Not yet. And again, this is one company that wreaks havoc. And by the way, to be fair, its impossible as the stuff continues to flood into these systems. And the question is do we we didnt want gatekeepers. That was the whole point of this, the open platforms. The fact that gate keepers sometimes are good because of this. This is what happens. If idea when a gatekeeper, there is a gate to keep bad things out. You open the door for the good stuff and close it behind you. And if you dont have that, then you get what we have. Kara swisher and benecol lines, thank you both for your time. As always, you check out our podcast, why is this happening, anywhere you get your podcast. Check out the s with comments. That is all in for this evening. The Rachel Maddow show starts i think i was just in shock i think i was just in shock to find out that shes gone. And the cause is a gunshot wound. You just wonder, how could this happen . It seems very surreal. A quiet night at home shattered by a gunshot. She came out of the shower, and i heard a pop, and theres blood a young wife dying on the floor. She wasnt talking at all. Im asking him, like, conrad, what happened here . I was utterly confused. So many different stories